


returning your time

by Pandolphin



Category: Dragon Quest XI
Genre: Choking, Gen, Not Beta Read, POV Second Person, Self-Harm, because. well. yeah, i am doing what the kids call 'projecting', suicidal idealation, vent - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-02
Updated: 2020-08-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:53:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25664692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pandolphin/pseuds/Pandolphin
Summary: Your life is one lived on the sacrifice of others. On borrowed time. For you to lose time simply means you’re returning it.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 6





	returning your time

**Author's Note:**

> My broken heart was blinded by a beautiful mind  
> And even if I could rewind it think I'll likely wind up lying  
> In a desperate kinda silence deep inside of this soul  
> To where my heart is where the darkness tends to swallow me hole  
> - _Hazy Skyscraper, DEMONDICE_

To lose time was to lose much, the Timekeeper had said. It was a genuine claim, not one to have taken lightly, and you knew that then and you know it now. 

And yet. Hearing those words spoken to you as a warning, all you could think to do then and all you can think to do now is laugh. 

You aren’t someone who can lose time. You’ve never lost any time of your own. All you do with time is take it. You take it from family that has loved you, friends that have followed you, people that have mourned you, people that have believed in you. The time you’ve been allotted has been built upon life after life after life long since lost and that, you know, and have known for a long while, is the only reason you are alive now. 

Your life is one lived on the sacrifice of others. On borrowed time. For you to lose time simply means you’re returning it. 

For what it’s worth, you understand why that is. You had things to do, important things, world-altering things, and you couldn’t really do any of them if you were dead. But those things are done now, and Erdrea is long since back on track, and now you have to make amends somehow. 

It’s easier said than done, but you think you know how to make things even. 

Tick, tock. Tick, tock. The clock on your nightstand chimes at ten pm. Everyone else is surely asleep by now, and like every other night, it’s time for you to pay the piper. 

Your hands reach forward and close around your neck. It’s soft. Warm. Alive. The fygg in your throats bobs underneath the pads of your thumbs, your hold still too gentle, and your pulse thumps in your grip. 

You swallow for air, instinctively, and in the stillness of your dark room that swallow feels louder than a monster’s roar. But you can’t have that. You’re supposed to be giving time back. Not taking more. And you press 

_down_

and the air and the time is knocked out of you. And you gasp, and you shudder, and tears prick at your eyes from the sudden force. 

But you don’t stop. 

You can’t stop. You can never stop. Not when so much time still goes stale in your lungs, rots in your veins, wasted on you and your life that exists only in quotation marks. There are so many others who need the time that’s been squandered on you, who deserve the chance at life you aren’t sure you earned anymore, and you need--you _have_ to set things right. 

So you keep pressing. You press and you squeeze and your heart jumps in your throat and in the moment you feel _pride_ for ignoring its cries for help. You cough and hack soundlessly into darkness, and spit flecks your chin and your pillow, and it’s fine. It’s all fine. It’s fine because you are the Luminary and it’s the Luminary’s job to set things right, and more often than not the way to do that is unknown and thankless and scary but every time it’s been worth it in the end. 

And if this wasn’t the right way, wouldn’t you have been stopped by now? 

There’s no point in talking about this. You’re not sure anyone would understand. Family or friends alike, you can’t imagine they would see this all the way you do. That this is your way of thanking them, apologizing to them, returning their lives and their time to them, even if they don’t realize what you’ve taken in the first place. So you stay quiet. It’s easier for everyone when you’re quiet. You have to make things easier for them however you can. Because you love them all, truly you do, and the people you love so dearly shouldn’t be the ones suffering just because you can’t get your act together. 

Your simple act of existence has brought more pain than you can comprehend. Has destroyed more than you know. You’re done with being a thieving burden. 

The room goes darker, bit by bit, breath by breath. The moonlight coming through your window starts to dim. Your grip starts to slip. You can vaguely feel your body go limp in against your bed, and your head hits your pillow and the world goes dark. 

You aren’t dead. 

Tick, tock, tick, tock, goes your clock. 

You stir with raspy breath and wet eyes. Your instinct of self-preservation is far too strong to let something like this be the death of you. You still have some things to do you can only do when you’re alive. But you can feel more of the time you’ve taken slip out of your hold, and your shoulders go lax with relief. 

You look at the clock. 10:11 pm. 

You raise your trembling hands again. 

You know this won’t kill you. It hasn’t before, and it won’t tonight. But there are so many clocks out there in the world, ticking and tocking away without fail; if one stops, you think, and you know, it isn’t going to make a difference. 

You inhale, once. And then you press down. 


End file.
